The present invention relates to a body fat meter equipped remote controller for a television/video recorder and a body fat meter arranged for measuring the impedance in the body of a subject to be measured and calculating the body fat of the subject from measurements of the impedance and physical data including the weight and the height of the subject.
In general, some body fat meters of such an impedance measurement type have been introduced which can measure the impedance in the body of a subject and calculate the body fat of the subject from measurements of the impedance and physical data including the weight and the height of the subject. More specifically, each of the conventional body fat meters for measuring the impedance in the body of a subject is designed for feeding a very small level of electric current between a pair of electrodes across the body of the subject and detecting an electric signal generated by the current running across the body of the subject to measure the impedance in the body. Then, the body fat of the subject is determined from the measurement of the impedance and the physical data including the weight and the height of the subject which are separately measured or have been recorded.
It is essential for measuring the impedance in the body of a subject with the conventional body fat meter of such an impedance measurement type to feed a very small level of the measuring current across the body of a subject to be measured. Although it is very small, the measuring current may cause some malfunctions of a specific medical device such as a pacemaker carried by the user thus resulting in the serious or fatal incident. For the safety of its user who carries a specific medical device such as a pacemaker, the conventional body fat meter comes with a safe-use notice printed directly on its outer surface or on its operation manual.
Another type of the conventional body fat meter for checking the number of pulses and measuring the body fat is known where the feeding of a small electric current across the body of a subject is systematically canceled when the subject is judged that its health condition is unfavorable for measurement of the body fat (as disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication HEI 11-178804).
Such a safety-use notice printed on the outer surface or the operation manual of the conventional body fat meter is simply a warning but not a positive safety measure. In case that the user carrying a specific medical device such as a pacemaker fails to check the notice printed on the outer surface or read the operation manual, it may switch on the body fat meter for measuring the body fat and hence expose itself to a risk of having a serious or fatal incident. Also, the teaching disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication HEI 11-178804 may hardly eliminate the above drawback.